


i spent time lying under stars / too much

by briath



Category: Friends at the Table (Podcast)
Genre: ??? - Freeform, Gen, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Inconsistent Verb Tenses, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-06
Updated: 2017-06-06
Packaged: 2018-11-09 20:52:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11112651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/briath/pseuds/briath
Summary: "Hey, does your robot have feet?"





	i spent time lying under stars / too much

**Author's Note:**

> spoilers up to like episode 30 of counter/WEIGHT, i think??

Mako found them deep in the bowels of the ship, after, once AuDy had kicked them all out of the cockpit. Except for Orth, of course, and Ibex--he shook his head a couple of times. Ibex was gone, too.

An almost imperceptible jerk of the ship shook him from his thoughts, blue-tinged. Fuck! His right hand stretched out to push against the lukewarm wall of the garbage ship--He gripped one of the green handrails instead. Fucking Orth and his fucking penchant for chores; his body creaked against the movement. Not like a door. 

He bit down on his tongue, hard, harder, and began righting himself again. His shoulders were still shaking: small, silent, aftershocks of the quivers that howled through the Kingdom Come, especially when AuDy--ah. Especially when AuDy did that thing they did, with the swooping. He heard them, then, Cass's voice floating towards him. He must've made a sound after all. "Hey, Mako? Is that you?" 

Their voice was tense, too. 

Mako turned the next corner to the hanger bay, and there they were. Cass, standing in front of the Arete, their head turned over their shoulder to look at Mako. Mako swallowed. Exhaled, once, then failed to keep a grin from his face. "Heyy buddy. What'cha doing? Are you alright?" Cass's brow furrowed, and their mouth dipped, but Mako kept going. His grin hurt. "I fucking hate that guy, you know? Man. September? Dude, that's a bad place! It's an extremely bad place to be, and a very sucky place to maybe die!!"  
Cass's eyes were very dark.

The hanger bay, a clunky piece of shit some architect/engineer-person had probably thought was a good idea while extremely drunk and also very far away from any ship, port, or individual qualified in any way, did not amplify his voice to an echo. So he didn't wince. And neither did Cass, even though the tenuously present acoustic qualities of the room dampened his voice, stripped from the outrage and ire he meant to put in. 

Mako's breath came quick. If the ringing calmness of the hanger bay, or his words, were supposed to have cleared up the storm on their face, they had both failed.

He took a couple faltering steps closer, peering up at the mech behind them--that's "a big fucking robot," he muttered--and drew up next to them.  
For a long moment, nothing moved. Then Cass took a step foward and slammed a flat hand onto the lower leg of the Arete. "I can't believe AuDy just let that guy on board." The Arete remained unmoving. Cass's hand, clenched, at their side. 

Mako's hand was smarting. 

His back ached. He would have very much liked to go take a nap in a locked closet somewhere, right now, an hour ago, or even just, curl up on the floor right here, beneath the Arete's long shadow and Cass's lingering assurance of wrath--

at the feet of--

His brain was a machine. Ibex, laughing. The steady thrum of the Kingdom Come at his back, Larry's Voice, his brain was a machine and this was what he was good for. 

"Cass?" "Hm?" "What are you doing here?" 

Cass snorted. "I'm, I'm just thinking. I mean, it's a lot to process, right?" "Sure, buddy! So like, hey, I can't help noticing you still wear your weird crown thing? What's, what's up with that?" "Mako, I--" "Like, the thing with the leaves! I don't get it, you left, right?" "Mako, I..." "We have sorta been hanging out, right? We're friends, come on," Mako interjected brightly, plopping himself down on the Arete's..feet? "Hey, does your robot have feet?" 

Cass looked taken aback for half a second, then sighed and shook their head. "No, yes, of course we're friends, it's just" He crossed his legs, frowning. "Oh, hey, is this about when-" "No," Cass interrupted, loudly, sounding more like one would expect a member of a royal family to sound than they had in the several weeks. (Mako considered himself something of an expert in this. He mentally congratulated himself on a job well done.) "No."

"It's not you. It's just. Hah. Thanks for punching Ibex in the face. That was..that was pretty cool. And he probably wouldn't have told us about Righteousness otherwise. So, good job." Cass's hand is now on his shoulder. He chances a glance at it, then up at Cass's face. The absence of lighting in the room makes it hard to properly make out their expression, but it gives their silhouette a dark outline. Like they are standing in the doorway to your house, unrecognizable and uninvited, and you had really thought you'd locked that door. But there they were. 

Mako turns his head. His shoulder twitches. Their hand slides off, hanging now limply against their thighs. "Right." He leans back against...the..it's an ankle, whatever. 

It is, in any case, not a closet, but since Orth will probably clean those, somehow, during the next three hours, maybe that's for the best. The darkness behind his eyelids is pretty soothing either way. 

Through his closed eyes, he hears a shuffling by his side, followed by the scratching sound of metal on metal sliding. Cass's breath comes in regular intervals.

"If I hadn't punched him," Mako begins, a little softer, "You would've. Or Jacqui. She looked really pissed off! And that would've been really bad, like, you guys might have broken his whole face instead of just his jaw!" Cass laughs a little. And while the sound is nowhere near jarring as it ought to be, the rhythm of it reminds his body of all the parts of it that are not happy with him right now, (He still has that bruise on his head, too) and he can't suppress a small hiss. It is a quiet one, still--in any other situation it would have probably gone unnoticed, rendered inaudible--but they are instead surrounded by the large voicelessness of two military riggers. And Cass hears it.

Their words cut through the big, ugly hall, cautious, precise. Doctor's words. He-might consider himself an expert. "Did you hurt your hand?" "Aha, yeah. It's cool tho." 

Opening his eyes requires too much effort, but Cass doesn't hide their long exhalation, nor the note of concern that swings with it. "You should probably get that looked at? Ice, maybe?" "You're the expert, doc." "Aha, I guess.."

They fall quiet again.

Mako slowly blinks open his left eye and looks. And there they are: Cass, with both their eyes closed, face still taut and greyish in sleep, but they're leaning back against the other leg of the Arete. They look less self-conscious in their sleep, their face still just a face. It is, Mako will grudgingly admit to himself and only himself (and, maybe, Larry), not all that bad. He just has an attractive crew. He is definitely, absolutely, an expert in this. 

He slowly angles himself away from Cass's face face again (staring is super creepy), and closes his eye.

A beach blips over the inside of his head. Ibex is there, wearing a smarmy grin, there's J-m, wearing a gigantic sky-blue tarp with only their uppermost camera's visible, sun, gold, an old Aria Joie hit single playing distantly, a fire, Larry's voice, saying, clearly above the waves and full of fear and certainty: "Is there room for me?" 

(In sleep, Mako Trig shifts, ever so slightly, closer to Cassander.)

**Author's Note:**

> "endless summer," by nate pritts.
> 
> (i was maybe gonna tag this pre-relationship, but. uh. hah.)


End file.
